Fall 2024 Syllabus

Overview

Overview

Computer science is both an applied and a conceptual discipline. You will learn how to program in this course, to allow you to bring your creative ideas to life. It can be frustrating at first. Computers are irritatingly literal machines, and challenge our ability to formulate clear and correct problem solving plans.

But programming is a skill. You will get better with practice. And you will get lots of practice! Computers are the most powerful tools that we have at our disposal to solve almost any problem. Learning how to get them to do your bidding is extremely empowering. You will quickly come to understand the hacker’s lament: you can do anything, but you can’t do everything⁽¹⁾.

Learning to program also trains you to think—to formulate correct and complete problem-solving plans and express them clearly. To solve a programming problem you must first read and understand the written description. Next, you must formulate a plan to solve the problem, which frequently requires correctly handling unusual situations. Next, you must write your plan down in a precise way that the computer can understand. At that point we’ll evaluate your submission to ensure that it fully solves the problem. If it doesn’t—which it probably won’t on the first few tries—you’ll need to understand the problem and adjust your plan accordingly.

Reading comprehension. Planning. Precise expression. Accepting, understanding, and fixing mistakes. These are intellectual abilities that you will develop through programming. But they are not limited to programming, and you will find them useful regardless of how you end up solving problems in the future.

While programming is important and enjoyable, computer science has deep conceptual concerns at its core. You’ll learn to design solutions to problems so that computers can carry them out efficiently. We call these algorithms. Designing computer algorithms requires clarity and precision that will improve your ability to solve any problem. And then you get to build your solutions and deploy them to billions of people across the world. No other field has this potent mixture of left-brain analytics, right-brain creativity, and global impact.

Description and Prerequisites

Description and Prerequisites

From the course catalog:

• Description: Basic concepts in computing and fundamental techniques for solving computational problems. Intended as a first course for computer science majors and others with a deep interest in computing.

• Prerequisites: Three years of high school mathematics or Math 112.

Required Materials

Required Materials

There is no required textbook for CS 124. All daily lessons are posted on this website.

You will need a personal machine capable of running Android Studio to complete the longer multi-part Android programming project assigned in the second half of the semester. For most students, a personal laptop or desktop computer is sufficient. If you do not have access to a personal computing device meeting these requirements, the university has several laptop loan programs you may want to explore. If you are really stuck, please contact the instructor to discuss your options. We want every student to be prepared to succeed in CS 124!

Learning Objectives

Learning Objectives

CS 124 works on both conceptual and skill-based levels. We teach you how to think, and we teach you how to do.

Conceptual Objectives

When you finish this course, you will be able to:

Programming Objectives

When you finish this course, you will be able to:

Preparation

Preparation

Some students in CS 124 have no experience with computer science. Others have been programming for years. But our goal is for everyone to succeed! In Fall 2022, the grade gap between students with and without prior experience was only 2%, and 83% of students earned an A grade! Regardless of whether you’ve programmed before, you can succeed in CS 124.

If you’re new to computer science…

Welcome to the most exciting field on Earth! We’re extremely happy to have you. We know that it can be hard to get started, but trust us—you’ll get better with practice. Programming is a skill. The more you do, the better you get. If you’re willing to put in the time and energy, we’re here to help you succeed. And you will.

When you’re starting something new, it’s normal to occasionally feel frustrated or intimidated by those around you. We were all new once, and most of us try new things at least once in a while. So we know what it feels like. Just remember that no matter how it may seem, there are a lot of other students in CS 124 that are beginners too. And if you’re working harder than some other students in the class, then it just means that you’re learning more than they are.

Also keep in mind that computer scientists can get extremely excited about what they know. Our field is awesome, and we’re all learning new things all of the time. Unfortunately, sometimes that can come off as boasting or bragging. Don’t let it get you down. We want you to share in the excitement, and will do our best to make sure that happens.

If you kind of already know what you are doing…

There’s so much more to learn! No matter how much background in computer science you have, there are always new areas to explore, new languages to learn (like Kotlin!), and new problems to solve. Even if you don’t find every aspect of CS 124 challenging, we hope that it can continue to move you forward on your journey in computer science. Keep in mind that continuing to develop as a programmer requires practice. If the MP checkpoints don’t take you that long, then you aren’t getting the practice that you need to keep improving. You might want to join the honors section, get involved with the ACM (Illinois Chapter of the Association for Computing Machinery), or just make sure that you have some side projects to keep you busy.

And please feel free to help other students in the class that might not know as much as you. One of the best things about computer science is the community of generous and patient people willing to help beginners get started.

If you really know what you are doing…

Perhaps you should sign up for the CS 124 Proficiency Exam and bypass CS 124 entirely?

General Education Information

General Education Information

CS 124 meets the University of Illinois General Education Requirements in the Quantitative Reasoning 1 category.

FAQ

FAQ

Here are answers to some commonly-asked questions about CS 124.

I want to register for a lab, but it’s full? Or I want to switch labs. Can you help me?

I want to register for a lab, but it’s full? Or I want to switch labs. Can you help me?

No, sorry. We have absolutely no control over registration. You’ll need to talk to an academic adviser.

I added the course late. What do I do?

I added the course late. What do I do?

We have special instructions for you here.

Design

Design

Moved here.

Course Activities

Course Activities

Daily lessons are designed by Geoffrey Challen, who has primary responsibility for course content and administration. You’ll also be viewing content created by Colleen Lewis, who co-taught CS 124 in Fall 2021 and added many Java walkthroughs and videos. Undergraduate and graduate course staff run online and in-person tutoring at all hours of the day and night.

Calendar

Calendar

We suggest that you add our course calendar to your calendaring program. All course programming, deadlines, and other activities will be posted on this calendar.

We have a description of all posted activities maintained on this page.

Lessons

Lessons

Programming is a skill. And the best way to learn to program and to get started with computer science is to do a little bit every day.

CS 124 course content is delivered through a series of daily lessons. Each lesson introduces new material through a combination of text, video, and interactive walkthroughs. Throughout each lesson are practice problems, and at the end of each lesson are one or two homework problems to complete to demonstrate your understanding of the lesson’s content. You should set aside time each day to review both lessons and complete both homework problems.

Quizzes

Quizzes

Each 50-minute quiz emphasizes the material covered since the previous quiz, but everything covered up to that point is fair game. Quizzes contain a mixture of multiple-choice questions covering course concepts along with programming questions and debugging challenges. The programming questions will be similar—but not identical—to the previous homework problems.

Keeping up with the lessons will prepare you for each quiz. Quizzes are taken in the Illinois CBTF, and scheduled using the CBTF scheduling website. CS 124 quizzes will be given on Mondays and Tuesdays throughout the semester.

Note that we will no provide overrides or retake opportunities for CS 124 CBTF quizzes. You are responsible for signing up to take them and showing up at your assigned time. Any missed quizzes will be subject to the quiz drop policy.

Tutoring Site

Tutoring Site

All course staff participate in providing individual assistance through our tutoring site. Tutoring hours will be posted on the calendar.

Communication

Communication

We have set up a comprehensive and well-organized course website and forum to help you find what you need to know. Our goal is to avoid email and other 1-to-1 forms of communication that don’t scale well to large numbers of students.

There are two primary sources of information for CS 124:

1. This website
2. The course forum

Most policy questions are answered in this syllabus. For almost anything else, search the forum—maybe another student has asked your question and we’ve already answered it. If you still can’t find an answer, post your question on the forum.

What You Are Responsible For

What You Are Responsible For

You are responsible for email sent to your @illinois.edu email address. We will occasionally use a course email list to send important announcements, particularly at the beginning of the semester.

You are responsible for messages posted in the announcements forum category. These announcements are important and we will frequently post in this category in lieu of using email. You can configure our course forum to send emails each time a topic is created in a specific category. We would suggest that you do that—or plan on visiting the forum each and every day. In fact, both are good ideas.

Contacting the Course Staff

Contacting the Course Staff

You may think that someone spending five minutes responding to your email is not a huge problem. But five-minute responses to 500 students consumes 40 hours. Help us help everyone, and post your question on the forum.

You should absolutely never directly message a member of the course staff who is not an instructor. All staff are instructed to not respond to direct messages. If you persist in attempting to contact them, disciplinary action may result.

This is not because we don’t like you. It’s simply because there are a lot of you, a much smaller number of us, and many of your questions are shared by other students. If you email us, we can answer your question to one person: you. (And right behind your email is another asking the same question.) If you post on the forum, we can answer your question once to the entire class. And you may find that your question has already been answered, or that another student can answer it for you.

Here is a general guide about how to contact the course staff:

• I need help installing (insert name of software here)…: post on the forum.
• I’m confused about (insert name of concept here)…: post on the forum.
• I need help with (insert any CS 124-related item here)…: post on the forum.
• I can’t find (insert name of CS 124-related resource here)…: post the forum.

You can probably see the pattern emerging here.

In contrast, here are some cases where you can and should contact the instructor:

• I think that my friend is cheating in CS 124: contact the course staff.
• I’m really sick and getting behind in the class: contact the course staff.
• I’m feeling really overwhelmed and need someone to talk to: contact the course staff, or an academic advisor, or a friend, or a counselor, or access mental health resources on campus.

In these cases please reach out to an instructor, either directly via email or using a private message on the course forum.

Collaboration

Collaboration

Unless specifically permitted, all work submitted for CS 124 must be your own. We describe exceptions that apply to homework problems and to portions of the machine project below.

Cheating in CS 124 may result in a grade reduction, removal from the CS program, or dismissal from the University of Illinois. We have many bright, honest students that want to learn computer science. We don’t waste time and energy on cheaters that don’t want to learn.

Specifically, the following activities constitute cheating and will be dealt with according to the relevant departmental and university policies.

You may not:

1. Turn in work that was completed by anyone other than yourself.
2. Copy or paste code that you did not write from any source.
3. Misrepresent your work as the work of another student.
4. Examine another classmates solution, reproduce it, and submit it as your own work.
5. Share information about the content of quizzes or other private course assessments with other students.
6. Publish your coursework anywhere where other students can find them.
7. Email or share your code with anyone in the class now or in future semesters.
8. Work on the MP without your partner if you have chosen to work with a human partner.

Note that this includes publishing your MP publicly on GitHub. Employers are typically uninterested in seeing your solutions to assignments that have also been completed by hundreds of other students. If you want to impress them, fill your online portfolio with independent creative work. We’ll help you get started with Android development this semester, which will allow you to pursue independent projects after completing CS 124. You may also want to look into completing a project as part of the CS 124 honors section: CS 199 124.

We will run cheating detection software on all submitted student work. These programs are extremely accurate, and any evidence of cheating that they uncover will initiate academic integrity violation proceedings. In Fall 2022 we filed 42 FAIR violations almost all of which resulted a letter grade reduction. We are serious about this, and ask you to be serious about learning.

A Rule of Thumb

A Rule of Thumb

A general rule of thumb is that exchanging or soliciting ideas about how to solve problems is not cheating, but exchanging code is cheating. Feel free to discuss your solutions with other students as long as you do not provide them or allow them to view your source code. If you are speaking or signing in English or another human language that’s fine. If you are exchanging computer code, that’s cheating.

Penalties

Penalties

If you are caught cheating in CS 124 you will definitely receive a FAIR violation. Depending on the severity of the situation, you may also have any of the following penalties applied:

• A letter grade reduction in the class.
• An F in the course.

Homework Collaboration

Homework Collaboration

The goal is to support each other’s learning and practice talking about the problems and computer science together. However, there are lots of ways to work together that could lead you both learning less than if you had worked independently. And please keep in mind that you will need to complete the weekly quiz on your own, and the homework problems are a critical way to prepare for the quizzes.

If you are interested in collaborating on the homework problems, you may do so freely. We encourage you to find good collaborators. A good collaborator is someone who works at a similar pace and who you feel comfortable exchanging questions with. When you complete the problem, you should both feel confident that you understand the problem you worked on together, and could tackle it on your own. Since you will need to on the next quiz!

You may examine code written by your collaborators—either in person or virtually. However, you may not electronically directly transfer or receive source code. Our homework problems prevent you from directly pasting text anyway, so this approach won’t be helpful. All collaborators must enter their own solution, and we expect to see small differences even from students who worked together.

One final thing to keep in mind is that the course staff are always available to help! You’ll find helpful course staff on our tutoring site for hours and hours each day and night. In many ways, our course staff are better prepared to collaborate with you on your homework than other students. They have completed the problems, but are not experienced enough to quickly notice every mistake. And, most importantly, they are trained to help you in ways that enable your learning, not just quickly lead to you to a solution.

MP Collaboration

MP Collaboration

Note that, regardless of how you choose to work on the project, your submissions will be checked for plagiarism in the same way, and you are always expected to adhere to CS 124 collaboration policies. The only exception is if you choose to work with another student. In that case, code submitted by you and your partner should be identical and submitted at similar times, since you should be completing all of your project work together, as described below.

We will provide more details about how to indicate that you are collaborating and who you are working with when the machine project is released.

Working Independently

You may choose to work independently on the machine project. The project is intended to be something that a single student can complete. For many students, they also learn the most when they work this way. Keep in mind that you have support from the course staff available whenever you need it!

Working With Another Student

If you choose to work with a human partner, you must complete all of your work on the MP together. You may not write or debug code without your partner. You also may not receive help from course staff without your partner.

This type of enforced collaboration is not common industry practice. Even developers who might choose to collaborate on trickier parts of a project would still perform most of their work independently. But our policy is designed to ensure you both have the opportunity to learn from all parts of the project. When you are working, you need to alternate who is driving—meaning using the keyboard. We recommend setting a timer to remind you when to switch drivers.

You cannot switch partners during the MP. But you and your partner can decide to end your collaboration at any point. If you decide to part ways, you and your partner can continue using the codebase that you worked on together until that point.

Utilizing AI Coding Tools

You may choose to take advantage of AI tools that support software development, such as GitHub Copilot and GPT. If you select this option, you must work independently, and not with another CS 124 student.

CS 124 does not provide explicit support or training in the use of these tools. However, you may find them helpful, both now and in the future.

A few notes if you choose this option:

1. Your code will still be checked for plagiarism. If you submit code that is highly-similar to code submitted by another student, we will move forward with academic integrity proceedings. Claiming that your code was generated by AI will not be considered a valid excuse. You should keep in mind that AI tools sometimes generate fairly unusual solutions, and code that might be similar to code generated by others using similar prompts.

2. Course staff will not assist you if you do not understand your own code. Do not ask AI to complete a portion of the code and then come to the tutoring site for support if you don’t understand what it generated. Debugging and understanding code generated by AI is part of the challenge of using these tools.

3. Quizzes will cover both coding and conceptual MP content. And you will be expected to complete these questions in the testing center unaided.

If you have questions about this option, please ask on the forum.

Grading

Grading

There may also may be opportunities to earn extra credit during the semester. Stay tuned!

Grade Components

Grade Components

Your total score in CS 124 is broken down as follows:

These weights are designed to reflect both the amount of time that students spend on each part of the class and the differences between the proctored and unproctored environments. You will spend most of your time completing the MP and homework problems. That is where you will get the practice that turns you into a computer scientist and hacker. The quizzes give us a chance to evaluate your abilities in a controlled setting.

Details about each grade component are included below.

Drops

Drops

To account for illness, absence, forgetfulness, mistakes, temporary stupidity, and other normal life events, we will drop a few of your lowest quiz and homework scores. The table above summarizes the drop policy for each grade component.

So, for example, we will assign roughly 70 homework problems and drop your lowest 6 scores. The machine project has approximately 4 checkpoints and we not drop any checkpoint scores.

Estimating Your Letter Grade

Estimating Your Letter Grade

Letter grades in CS 124 are assigned based on how well you do, not on your performance relative to other students. We have an unlimited number of A grades! If everyone in learns the material, everyone will make an A. Our goal as course staff is to help everyone succeed.

Inevitably the difficulty of various parts of the course varies from semester to semester. We do not release the final grading scale until the end of the semester. Please do not ask us to estimate your grade.

Instead, focus on learning the material to the best of your ability. Programming in particular is a skill—the more you do, the better you get. Focus on doing as much as you need to become proficient, rather than the amount required to make a particular grade.

Posting Grades

Posting Grades

CS 124 maintains its own gradebook on the course website. We do not post grades on other websites or platforms.

Homework (10%)

Homework (10%)

Each CS 124 lesson contains a small programming problem for you to complete. Some contain debugging challenges as well. Completing the daily homework and debugging challenge will help ensure that you are well-prepared for each week’s quiz. Quiz programming problems will be similar to the ones that you completed on the homework during the previous week.

Late Submission Policy

Late Submission Policy

It is extremely important that you keep up with the daily homework. If you fail to complete the homework regularly, you will struggle on the weekly quizzes, which draw heavily from concepts reinforced by the previous week’s homework.

However, we also want you to complete the homework, even if you don’t get to it right on time. To balance these competing objectives, we provide partial credit for some homework submissions after the deadline. This will be clearly marked on each homework on on the grading page. For example, for many problems you may lose 2 points out of 10 total per day late.

Quizzes (60%)

Quizzes (60%)

CS 124 quizzes consist of a mixture of multiple-choice questions, programming questions, and debugging challenges. All questions are automatically graded. Unlike other “top” CS programs, we evaluate your programming not on paper but in a much more sane setting: using a keyboard, and with automated computer-generated feedback to help you identify and correct your mistakes. You know—the way you’ll actually write code in the real world.

No course staff are involved in grading CS 124 quizzes, so please do not appeal your grade to the course staff. If you have concerns about the questions themselves, please post on the forum after the quiz ends. We have also begun releasing the programming questions from each quiz after the quiz ends, and so you may use these to continue to practice and understand the mistakes you made during the quiz. You can check your official quiz scores using our online grading page.

Format

Format

Quiz questions are a mix of multiple-choice questions drawn from lesson content, small programming problems, and debugging challenges. Programming problems may be drawn from previous homework or appear later as homework.

Most multiple-choice questions allow unlimited attempts, albeit for a decreasing number of points. We do want you to eventually find out what the right answer is, even if you didn’t know it at first.

You have unlimited attempts at the programming problems and debugging challenges without losing credit. At this stage, we want you to practice—and we won’t penalize you for doing so. However, obviously you do not have an unlimited amount of time to complete the quiz.

The multiple-choice questions should be easy if you have following along with the daily lessons. You may find the programming questions and debugging challenges more challenging. Programming under time pressure can be difficult and stressful. You don’t have unlimited time or access to resources such as the course staff or the internet. However, we believe that there are small programming and debugging tasks that you should be able to complete as the semester goes on without needing to look up things online or ask for help.

Quiz Preparation

Quiz Preparation

Quizzes focus on material covered since the previous quiz, but all material covered to that point in semester is fair game. The best way to prepare for a quiz is to complete the previous lessons. Read the lesson, watch the videos and walkthroughs, and interact with the examples, attempt the practice problems—and then complete the homework problem and debugging challenges. If you engage with the course content on a daily basis, you will not need to cram material right before the quiz.

Missed Quizzes

Missed Quizzes

Do not contact the course staff regarding missed quizzes. We will drop your 3 lowest quiz scores when computing the quiz component of your final grade.

If you miss a CBTF reservation, you will need to visit the CBTF in-person to reschedule. However, the ability to reschedule is based on availability, and not guaranteed. We will not extend quiz windows to accommodate students who miss quizzes.

Catch-Up Quiz Grading

Catch-Up Quiz Grading

The material in CS 124 is cumulative, and in large part each daily lesson build on the material covered previously. And, we realize that sometimes, you think you’ve understood a concept, but your performance on a quiz proves otherwise. If you perform poorly on a quiz, what we want you to do to continue to succeed in CS 124 is go back and review that material so that you catch up and are prepared to move forward!

That’s why we provide a catch-up quiz grading policy. Here’s how it works. If you do better on Quiz N + 1 than on Quiz N, we’ll increase your score on Quiz N to the average of the two scores. For example, let’s say you struggle on Quiz 3 and earn a 70, but then rally on Quiz 4 for a 90. Since your performance on Quiz 4 indicates knowledge of the material tested on Quiz 3, we’ll increase your Quiz 3 score to 80: (70 + 90) / 2. (If you do worse on Quiz 4, your Quiz 3 score remains unchanged. This policy will never lower any quiz grade.)

There are a few caveats. First, we don’t apply catch-up quiz grading to quizzes that you miss. So you have to take Quiz N for us to apply it after you complete Quiz N + 1.

Second, there are a few points in the semester when we begin new material: specifically Quiz 6 (beginning of objects) and Quiz 10 (beginning of data structures and algorithms). Because these quizzes cover different material than the preceding quiz, we do not apply catch-up quiz grading to the preceding quizzes: which would be Quiz 5 (the last quiz on imperative programming) and Quiz 9 (the last quiz on objects).

Finally, catch-up quiz grading does not ripple backward. So we increase you score on Quiz N because you did better on Quiz N + 1, we don’t then go back and adjust Quiz N - 1, and so on.

Catch-up quiz grades are shown on the grading page as the “Final Score” column in the quiz score table, with the original score in the “Original Score” column.

Reporting Quiz Problems

Reporting Quiz Problems

If you believe that you have spotted a problem with a quiz question, please report the problem to the course staff on the forum. Do not post your questions publicly.

At that point we will do one of the following:

• If the question has a bug, we will fix it and ensure that all students receive full credit—even those that took the quiz before the bug was identified.
• If the question has a minor typo that we don’t think affects its ability to be correctly answered, we will fix it and distribute that change.
• If the question is fine we will not do anything.

However, please keep in mind that your perception of the question’s correct answer may be wrong. That’s the whole idea behind having the quizzes in the first place! We will run weekly programs reviewing quiz content, although they will not be recorded.

CBTF Policies

CBTF Policies

We use the Grainger College of Engineering’s Computer-Based Testing Facility for our quizzes. The policies of the CBTF are the policies of this course, and academic integrity infractions related to the CBTF are infractions in this course. If you have accommodations identified by the Division of Rehabilitation-Education Services (DRES) for quizzes, please submit your Letter of Accommodations (LOA) through the CBTF website as soon as possible. It can take up to five days for your LOA to be processed, and if you make a reservation before your LOA has been processed, your reservation will not include your testing accommodations and you will be required to reschedule. This must be done each semester you use the CBTF.

If you have any issue during an exam, inform the proctor immediately. Work with the proctor to resolve the issue at the time before logging off. If you do not inform a proctor of a problem during the test then you forfeit all rights to addressing the problem you experienced during your exam.

Take the 10-minute CBTF Orientation and review their instructions before your first exam.

Final Exam

Final Exam

CS 124 does not have a final exam. We will run the last quiz on the Tuesday of the final week of class, but we do not give an assessment during our scheduled exam time.

Machine Project (MP) (30%)

Machine Project (MP) (30%)

The MP is worth 30% of your grade. Working on it will deepen your understand of the material covered in lecture, and improve your performance on the quizzes.

Not Machine Problems: A Machine Project

Not Machine Problems: A Machine Project

Many other programming courses give a series of unconnected programming assignments. In prior semesters CS 124 did this as well and referred to each as a machine problem.

However, in 2019 we replaced the multiple unconnected assignments with a single machine project: an Android application that you will complete in parts over the second half of the semester. We hope that this format will encourage you to fix up and improve the parts of the project that you completed previously, while also allowing you to complete a more substantial project.

It is rare in software development to start something from scratch, work on it for only a few weeks, and then never touch it again. Completing a single longer project will better prepare you for future programming tasks—both in industry and side projects that you may do on your own. What is more normal is to work on more interesting and larger pieces of code for months or even years—starting with something simple and then gradually adding features and complexity, just as you will do this semester. You are forced to live with your mistakes and decisions, but also end up creating something much more significant.

How to Complete the MP

How to Complete the MP

To help you conquer the large machine project, we break it down into checkpoints that will happen roughly once every two weeks once the project begins. Each checkpoint is designed to take a significant amount of time. You should arrange your schedule so that you can devote a significant amount of time on them. Do not start the night before. Not only will it be unlikely that you will complete that component of the MP, but you will also be unlikely to be able to get help when you get stuck.

Learning to program is like learning other skills—how to play an instrument, throw a tight spiral, cook the perfect omelet, or learn another human language. You have to do it every day. You can’t expect to complete a marathon or perform at Carnegie Hall if you start practicing the night before.

As soon as each checkpoint is released, sit down and spend a few hours on it. And then do that the next day, and the day after that. If you start early and work often, you will have no problem completing the checkpoint before the deadline. If it turns out to be easy for you, you’ll be done early and can relax and help other students. If it turns out to be more difficult, you’ll know early on and be able to budget your time accordingly to complete it on time. Nothing correlates more strongly with success on the MP checkpoints than starting early.

Staggered Deadline Policy

Staggered Deadline Policy

The CS 124 project is completed over a series of checkpoints, each with its own deadline. However, you’ll notice that each checkpoint has two deadlines—one for the Orange (or Blue) Team, and the second one day later for the Blue (or Orange) Team. You’ll be assigned to one deadline team at random, and if you choose to collaborate, collaborators will be assigned to the same deadline team when they form a group.

Why we do this is simple: It allows the course staff to provide better support around deadlines. Despite the fact that the best way to succeed on the project is to start early and follow our schedule, some of you will still end up needing last-minute support. Splitting the class in half allows us to do a better job of supporting everyone, and has been shown to significantly reduce wait times near checkpoint deadlines.

Isn’t this unfair? After all, for each checkpoint, one team’s deadline will be earlier. This is a valid concern. Note that we will provide each team with the test suites needed to start each checkpoint as soon as they complete the previous checkpoint, to provide both teams with an equivalent amount of time between receiving the tests and the due date.

This is also not the first time that we have used the split deadline model. In the past, performance of both teams was indistinguishable, indicating that neither had an advantage. We will review the performance on the MP of both teams again at the end of this semester and correct any large disparities if needed.

At the end of the day, staggered deadlines help everyone do better on the project by flattening load spikes on the tutoring site, tutoring center, and forum. As always, the goal of the entire staff is for everyone to succeed at the project. This helps us support you in that shared goal.

Late Submission Policy

Late Submission Policy

It is extremely important that you keep up with the MP. CS 124 moves quickly, and if you get behind early you will quickly find yourself lost and unable to complete the later assignments.

As a result, the late submission policy is designed to reward students that do a fair amount of work before the deadline. Here are the details of the policy:

• We award points on most MP checkpoints for starting on time and reaching a certain milestone well before the checkpoint is due
• You can submit each MP checkpoint as many times as you want until 11:59:59 PM on Wednesday 12/11/2024.
• Late submissions can earn back 50% of any points lost by your best on-time submission. So if you submit code that earns 80/100 before the deadline, you will receive a 90/100 if you submit a perfect checkpoint (100/100) after the deadline. If you submit code that earns 0/100 before the checkpoint deadline, the best you can do is a 50/100 with a perfect submission anytime after the deadline.
• Late submissions will not recover any starting-on-time points. So if there were 10 starting-on-time points that you did not earn, and your best score before the deadline was a 60/100, the best you can do is a 75/100: half of the 30 points you missed that were not for starting on time.
• You will always receive the best score earned by any submission.

Extra Credit

Extra Credit

There may be opportunities to earn extra credit this semester. Note that we do not give extra credit for things that we think that you absolutely should be doing to succeed in the class. We might provide extra credit for providing some data that helps improve the class, or bearing with us while we try something experimental and new, or for helping other students.

We’ll definitely let you know about any extra credit opportunities as they arise.

Accommodations

Accommodations

We are more than happy to make arrangements to help accommodate students with disabilities. Please assist us by informing us of your situation as soon as possible. The earlier in the semester you can let us know what kind of help you need, the better prepared we can be to provide it effectively.

Please upload your Letter of Accommodation using this form, to ensure we have it on file. Note that to access this form, you will first need to visit the Illinois Cloud Dashboard and enable Google Apps Integration. To receive testing accommodations on weekly quizzes, you will also need to provide your letter to the CBTF, using their form.

Note that in many cases your letter of accommodation will require that you request accommodations before or on the relevant deadlines. If you fail to do so, we will not consider late requests. Part of our job in ensuring that you succeed in CS 124 is keeping you on track throughout the semester. By the time the end of the semester rolls around, it is far too late to begin asking for deadline extensions and completing missed assignments.

Other Policies

Other Policies

Extensions

Extensions

CS 124 is a fast-moving and demanding course. You signed up to learn computer science and programming for 15 weeks, and we do our best to give you your money’s worth.

One of the consequences of this is that it is hard to catch up if you have a significant illness or other problem mid-semester. We will give extensions on the MP and other assignments to accommodate unforeseen short-term circumstances. But if you are struggling with a larger issue, you should consider withdrawing and enrolling again next semester.

To receive an extension you should approach the course staff before the relevant deadline. Except in exceptional cases—hospitalization, verifiable kidnapping by aliens—we will not grant requests for extensions or other accommodations after the relevant deadline has passed.

Diversity Statement

Diversity Statement

If there is anything that we can do to make you more comfortable in CS 124, please let us know. Here’s the official Illinois text that has helpful info:

Mental Health Statement

Mental Health Statement

We will discuss how to stay sane in computer science at various points throughout the semester. But overall, if there is anything that we can do to support your mental health during the semester, please let us know. Here’s the official Illinois text that has helpful info:

• Counseling Center: 217-333-3704, 610 East John Street Champaign, IL 61820
• McKinley Health Center: 217-333-2700, 1109 South Lincoln Avenue, Urbana, Illinois 61801

Classroom Climate

Classroom Climate

Our staff are committed to creating a classroom environment that welcomes all students, regardless of their identities—race, class, gender, sexual orientation, religious beliefs. We all have unconscious biases, and we will try to continually examine our judgments, words and actions to keep our biases in check and treat everyone fairly. We hope you will do the same. If you feel comfortable, please let us know if there is anything we can do to make sure everyone is encouraged to succeed in this class.

Here’s the official Illinois text that has helpful info:

Wellbeing and Distress

Wellbeing and Distress

Your wellbeing should be your top priority and much more important than this class. We consider wellbeing as being able to continually meet your needs for sleep, food, exercise, socializing, relaxing, and emotional support. We want to destigmatize distress, but not normalize distress. It is unfortunately common to experience distress in school and I want you to know that you’re not alone if you’re experiencing some form of distress. When this happens, reaching out is essential! If we normalize this distress, we might incorrectly assume that we shouldn’t reach out.

Here’s the official Illinois text that has helpful info:

• Counseling Center: 217-333-3704, 610 East John Street Champaign, IL 61820
• McKinley Health Center: 217-333-2700, 1109 South Lincoln Avenue, Urbana, Illinois 61801

Confidential Resources

Confidential Resources

If students want to speak with someone confidentially, these resources are available on and off campus. Speaking with a confidential resource does not preclude students from making a formal report to the Title IX Coordinator. Confidential resources can walk students through all of their reporting options. They can also provide students with information and assistance in accessing academic, medical, and other support services they may need.

Here’s the official Illinois text that has helpful info:

Religious Observances

Religious Observances

Even when religious holidays don’t fall on a class day, you might typically take time off from work to celebrate.

The CS 124 drop policy is how we accommodate religious observations that affect your ability to complete the homework. If you need to take a quiz early or a day late, or need an extension on the machine project, please let us know. We can work together to make a plan that works for you.

Here’s the official Illinois text that has helpful info: